Chapter 8: Emotion and Motivation

Question 1

Emotion

Answer 1

A positive or negative experience that is associated with a particular pattern of physiological activity

Question 2

James-Lange Theory

Answer 2

stimuli trigger activity in the autonomic nervous system, which in turn produces an emotional experience in the brain

• Emotional experienve is the consequence - not the cause - of our physiological reactions to objects and events in the world

Question 3

Cannon-Bard Theory

Answer 3

Stimulus simultaneously triggers activity in the autonomic nervous system and emotional experience in the brain

Question 4

Two-Factor Theory

Answer 4

emotions are inferences about the causes of physiological arousal

• Example
  
  • when you are physiologically aroused in the presence of something you think should scare you, you label that arousal as fear. But if you have precisely the same bodily response in the presence of seomthing that you think should delight you, then you label that arousal as *excitement *

Question 5

appraisal

Answer 5

an evaluation of the emotion-relevant aspects of a stimulus

• the amygdala is critical to making these appraisals

Question 6

Fast Pathways and Slow Pathways

Answer 6

According to Joseph LeDoux, information about a stimulus takes two routes simultaneously: the “fast pathway” (shown in pink), which goes from the thalamus directly to the amygdala, and the “slow pathway” (shown in green), which goes from the thalamus to the cortex and then to the amygdala. Because the amygdala receives information from the thalamus before it receives information from the cortex, people can be afraid of something before they know what it is.

Question 7

Activity when people experience emotions

Answer 7

show increased activity in the amygdala and decreased activity in the cortex

Question 8

Activity when people inhibit these emotions

Answer 8

they show increased cortical activity and decreased amygdala activity

• In a sense the amygdala presses the emotional gas pedal and the cortex hits the brakes
• Both adults and children with cortical damage have difficulty inhibiting their emotions

Question 9

Emotion Regulation

Answer 9

the cognitive and behavioral strategies people use to influence their own emotional experience

• typically a way to cheer up

Question 10

Reappraisal

Answer 10

changing one’s emotional experience by changing the meaning of the emotion-eliciting stimulus

• For example
  
  • participants in one study who watched a circumcision that was described as a joyous religious ritual had slower heart rates, had lower skin conductance levels, and reported less distress than did participants who watched the circumcision but did not hear the same description

Question 11

Emotional Expression

Answer 11

an observable sign of an emotional state

Question 12

Universality Hypothesis

Answer 12

emotional expressions have the same meaning for everyone

• every human being naturally expresses happiness with a smile, and every human being naturally understands that a smile signifies happiness

Question 13

Facial feedback hypothesis

Answer 13

emotional expressions can cause the emotional experiences they signify

• For example
  
  • people feel happier when they are asked to make the sound of a long “e” or to hold a pencil in their teeth (smile expression) than when they are asked to make a sound of long “u” or hold a pencil in their lips

Question 14

How do people with damaged amygdala’s recognize other people’s emotions?

Answer 14

first off, they have trouble experience fear and anger and are typlically poor at recognizing the expressions of those emotions in others

Question 15

Display rules

Answer 15

norms for the control of emotional expression

• example
  
  • When your roommate makes a sarcastic remark about your haircut, you may make the facial expression for contempt (accompanied, perhaps, by a reinforcing hand gesture), but when your boss makes the same remark, you probably swallow hard and display a pained smile.

Question 16

Techniques of Display Rules

Answer 16

• Intensification
  
  • exaggerating the xperssion of one’s emotion
  • a person pretends to be more surprised by a gift than she really is
• Deintensification
  
  • muting the expression of one’s emotion
  • when the loser of contest tries to look less distressed than he really is
• Masking
  
  • expressing one emotion while felling another
  • when a poker player tries to look distressed rather than delighted as she examines a hand with four aces
• Neutralizing
  
  • felling an emotion but displaying no expression
  • when a judge tries not to betray his leaning while lawyers are making their arguments

Question 17

Features the distinguish between sincere and insincere facial expressions

Answer 17

• Morphology
  
  • certain facial muscles tend to resist conscious control
  • only geniue smiles crinkles the corners of the eyes
• Symmetry
  
  • expressions are a bit more symmetrical than insincere expressions
  • a slightly lopsided smile is less likely to be genuine than is a perfectly even one
• Duration
  
  • sincere expressions tend to last between a half second and 5 seconds
  • expressions that last shorter or longer periods are more likely to be insincere
• Temporal Patterning
  
  • sincere expressions appear and disappear smoothly over a few seconds
  • insincere expressions tend to have more abrupt onsets and offests

Question 18

Motivation

Answer 18

the purpse for or psychological cause of an action

Question 19

hedonic principle

Answer 19

the claim that people are motivated to experience pleasure and avoid pain

Question 20

Homeostasis

Answer 20

the tendency for a system to take action to keep itself in a particular state

Question 21

Drive

Answer 21

an internal state caused by physiological needs

• what causes us to want to meet our needs

Question 22

Bulimia Nervosa

Answer 22

a disorder characterized by binge eating followed by purging

Question 23

Anorexia Nervosa

Answer 23

A disorder characterized by an intense fear of being fat and severe restriction of food intkae

Question 24

Metabolism

Answer 24

the rate at which energy is used

Question 25

Human Sexual Response Cycle

Answer 25

the stages of phsiological arousal during sexual activity

Question 26

Mortality-Salience Hypothesis

Answer 26

the prediction that people who are reminded of their own mortality will work to reinforce their cultural worldviews

Question 27

Intrinsic Motivation

Answer 27

A motivation to take actions that are themselves rewarding

• Eating a french fry, listening to music
• They are the payoff

Question 28

Extrinsic Motivation

Answer 28

A motivation to take actions that lead to reward

• work hard for $
• When threats and rewards change intrinsic motivation into extrinsic motivation, unexpected consequences can follow

Question 29

Conscious Motivations

Answer 29

motivations of which people are aware

Question 30

Unconscious MOtivations

Answer 30

motivations of which people are not aware

Question 31

Need for achievement

Answer 31

the motivation to solve worthwhile problems

Question 32

Approach Motivation

Answer 32

motivation to experience a positive outcome

Question 33

Avoidance Motivatoin

Answer 33

Motivation no to experience a negative outcome

• tend to be more powerful

Question 34

Yerkes-Dodson Law

Answer 34

the law dictates that performance increases with physiological or mental arousal, but only up to a point. when levels of arousal become too high, performance decreases

• Do not want to be overwhelmed or underwhelmed
• Want to be engaged just enough to be interested - perform best under these conditions
• We are always looking for “optimal” level of arousal

Question 35

Intrinsic MOtivation

Answer 35

a motivation to take actions that are themselves rewarding

Question 36

Extrinsic MOtivation

Answer 36

motivation to take actions that are not themselves rewarding, but that leads to reward

• Extrinsic rewards can undermine intrinsic motivation

Question 37

Social Exclusion Theory

Answer 37

humans have an underlying need to belong, which drives behavior and influences emotion

• not quantity, but quality of social suppot

Question 38

Social Comparison Theory

Answer 38

seek out company of those who are in the same emotional state that we are currently experiencing

• Anxious ridden people seek out other anxious people for company

Question 39

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Answer 39

human beings are motivated to satisfy a variety of needs. Some needs must be satisfied before others so he created a hierarchy with the most immediate needs on the bottom and the most deferrable needs at the top

Question 40

Emotion Systems in the Brain

Answer 40

• Left Hemisphere dominant people show greater positive affect
• Right hemisphere dominance redicts negative affect
• Left brained people recover from negative emotions quicker than right brained people
• Mindfulness research showed that rewiring of the brain is possible so that right-brained people can train themselves to feel more with their left brian

Question 41

Goleman’s 5 Aptitudes of Emotional Intelligence

Answer 41

1. Self-Awareness
2. Self-Soothing
3. Self-Motivation
4. Empathy
5. Effective Relating
6. Delaying Gratification